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A Valley Dark and Scorned

The Dragons Rise

By Renee WatleyPublished 2 years ago 5 min read
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CHAPTER ONE-

“There weren’t always dragons in the Valley.”

Jon turned to Anya with furrowed brows, tightening his coat as the cold wind whipped around their lookout tower. It was less than five feet from the steep Ivory Cliffs that looked directly down onto the dragon-ridden Valley, making it the coldest and most miserable of all the outpost towers. It was also the one that Anya insisted they take each time they were on lookout duty.

“Come again?”

“You know the dragons didn’t always control the Valley? That we once lived freely down there ourselves?”

Jon rolled his eyes and ran a gloved hand through his dark curly hair. This was the fourth time she had told him this story. They had known each other their entire lives and she had never been able to remember which crazy idea she had told him and which she had not. Sometimes it was charming. Today it was irritating.

“Sure we did, Anya.”

“We did! And we can live there again if the Chancellor would just—”

“Hargrove!”

Anya and Jon both flinched at the sound of the third voice. Captain Elias Cochrane walked up the ramp to the lookout tower. Anya and Jon, well-trained soldiers, both stood at attention.

Elias towered over them when he reached the top of their platform. He was taller than most in the 112th Legion of the human colony of Presidia, giving rise to the rumor that he was part giant. Elias hated that rumor, which made it Anya’s favorite to throw back in his face when she found him particularly irritating. Jon had never been brave enough to try insulting Elias.

“Hargrove,” Elias addressed Anya. “I’ve received numerous complaints from other cadets about your dragon stories.”

“It’s not an story! It’s a call to action! If Chancellor Caridan would just listen and assemble an army like we had when the dragons first—”

Elias raised his hand to stop her and leaned his enormously wide body over Anya’s tiny frame.

“Hargrove, you are on my last nerve. Keep this up and you will be reassigned to lavatory duty.”

Though several colorful insults immediately sprang to the front of her mind, she bit her tongue and nodded. Elias turned and proceeded down the ramp toward the next watch tower.

“Anya, you have to stop with these stories,” Jon warned.

“Why? If everyone thinks they’re just stories, why would I care what anyone says about me?”

“Because you could be thrown onto the Wall for making such a nuisance of yourself.”

Anya sighed. Guarding the Wall outside of Presidia’s capitol city was supposedly the worst assignment in the 112th Legion. It was cold and lonely, the perfect place to send any soldier that made any sort of a fuss.

“Maybe the Wall wouldn’t be so bad,” she said, leaning over to the basket of food they had been sharing and pulling out a thick piece of bread.

“You stuck in a tower by yourself? With no one to annoy? It sounds like pure torture for you.”

She threw her bread at Jon’s face as hard as she could.

“I’m perfectly capable of being alone.”

“What if they force you to read the textbooks they used to give us in school? The ones you have a nasty habit of saying are utter horse shit?”

She had heard the stories they were told in school: that the Dragons ruled the Valley and that no other creature dared venture down that way or risk being eaten. But Anya knew that wasn’t true. The Valley rightfully belonged to the humans—they had been driven out.

“It has to be true.”

“If it’s true, why the cover up?” Jon asked. “Why wouldn’t we have been training and amassing an army to retake our rightful land?”

“That’s a brilliant question,” Anya replied. “One I fully intend to find the answer to.”

Jon laughed.

“You are a ridiculous person, Anya Hargrove.”

“You are not ridiculous enough, Jon Eres.”

Jon laughed.

“How do you intend to find out if this is true?”

Anya took a thoughtful breath.

“Chancellor Caridan would have access to records, something that proves we have rightful claim to that land.”

Jon cocked a smile.

“Rightful claim? Why would we even want it? It’s a wasteland.”

“It’s only that way because of the dragons! If we drive them out we can reclaim it and build it up again. It can be a paradise!”

Jon took a bite of a peach he had in his basket of food.

“Once you come up with a concrete plan, you let me know and I’ll supply the peaches.”

Anya laughed and turned to look over the Valley. It was certainly a wasteland now, but the potential was obvious. The dried-up riverbed had potential to be a flowing rushing river again. The dead trees could flower under the careful watch of a gardener or an army of gardeners. The wide desert plains could be rolling green hills again.

Anya and Jon both immediately covered their ears as a chorus of ungodly roars rocketed through the air, rattling their wooden tower. In the Valley, several terrifying bursts of fire pierced the sky.

“Take cover!” ordered Elias, racing into the armory, other soldiers following suit.

They were all familiar with the protocol. Any sign of movement from the valley meant every human had to hide. There could be no risk of a dragon seeing humans at the Landing: a famously abandoned Presidian military base. The horrors dragons could unleash upon captured humans was unthinkable.

Anya and Jon both dropped through a trap door into a hidden compartment and waited as the dragons flew by, screeching fire as they went. Anya held her breath as the enormous shadows flew over them. She had been through this before, but the lingering fear that the dragons would catch the scent of one of the soldiers or some scrap of their food was always prevalent.

It took far too long, but eventually, there was silence.

“Finally,” Jon muttered, unshuttering his latch, and returning to the upper platform. Anya followed quickly after, looking down to the abandoned Valley city below. She had done four tours at the outpost, but an idea occurred to her that hadn’t before and if she was going to act on it, she had only a few moments to do so.

She turned to look at Jon, a cheeky grin forming.

“What are you going to do?”

“Probably something foolish.”

She tightened her belt and secured her sword at her side.

She turned to Jon and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek before grabbing her rope and grapple.

She climbed onto the ledge of the outpost and swung around, turning to face a horrified Jon.

“Oh Gods, Anya, what are you doing?!”

She winked at him.

“Don’t wait up.”

She let go of the ledge and fell over the immense Ivory Cliffs, falling toward the Valley below.

Fantasy
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About the Creator

Renee Watley

I am a storyteller. Music, novels, theater, any way I can create a story the better. Hopefully there's someone out there who likes what I have to say.

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